Internal E-mails Say Dock Street Bad Site for School

Newly released documents reveal that Department of Education architects felt that Two Trees’ controversial Dock Street DUMBO project “would yield a very small school (compromised from our standards) with premium costs due to the mixed use with the high-rise residential building.”

However, the two-year-old internal e-mails do not address the current plans for the site, according to the School Construction Authority.

Among the concerns:

Although Two Trees said the school would be a total of 45,000 square feet, the plans suggest it would be closer to 40,000 square feet—10% smaller.

The school’s proximity to a manufacturing zone and the high-traffic Brooklyn Bridge create “potential safety, environmental and noise impacts” and “traffic noise and pollution and minimizing daylight and fresh air.”

The school’s proposed gym would only be 15 feet high, not the original 20. At that height, it would only be two feet taller than a basketball backboard.

The figures were found in e-mails obtained and released by Councilmember David Yassky, under the Freedom of Information Act.

The new information, however, doesn’t take into account recent modifications and the ongoing design process for the project, said William Havemann, Department of Education spokesman.

“I think that it’s important to note that there are challenges presented in any potential school site across the city,” he said. “The emails that [Yassky] has released acknowledge those challenges in the Dock Street site.” He maintained that it would have been “fiscally irresponsible” of the city to have passed up receiving the land, core and shell of the building from the developer at no cost.